In various manufacturing and construction industries, pipes or conduit are cut to length from stock. During cutting, a burr or thin edge is raised. Depending on the conduit material and the method of cutting, the burr may be quite sharp and may injure workers or items that brush against the burr. For example, insulated wires are typically pulled through conduit after the conduit is installed. Any burrs that remain at the ends of the conduit may damage the insulation. Accordingly, the cut pieces of conduit are finished in preparation for assembly. Finishing steps generally include removing the burr and may also include shaping the profile of the cut end. For example, to ease assembly of conduit and connecting joints, the profile of the cut end may be rounded or tapered to facilitate assembly.
For relatively small conduit with an inside diameter of ¼ inch to about 1 inch, conventional deburring tools are readily available. These conventional deburring tools generally include a portion with an outside diameter that is approximately the same size as the inside diameter of the conduit to deburr. A cutter extends out one side of the conventional deburring tool. The conduit is deburred by inserting the tool into the open cut end of the conduit until the cutter contacts the cut edge and the tool is twisted one or more full rotations until the edge is properly formed.
Unfortunately, the tool must be sized for the conduit being cut and will not work for conduit that is over or undersized. In addition, conventional deburring tools for large conduit and pipes are large, heavy, expensive and difficult to use. For larger conduit having an inside diameter of about 2 inches to greater than 6 inches, the industry standard deburring tool is a half-round file. Hand filing a smooth profile in large conduit is labor intensive, extremely time consuming, and potentially physically hazardous.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a method and apparatus capable of overcoming the disadvantages described herein at least to some extent.